La Serva Padrona and A Midsummer Night's Dream
An arty day. In the afternoon I attended Opera Box's production of Pergolesi's "La Serva Padrona" at Tokyo Bunka Kaikan's small hall. This is not my type of music - early 18th century played on four period instruments - a baroque violin, cello and oboe with harpsichord. A cast of three - a good soprano, a good baritone and a tenor who had very little to sing. The production was silly - as befits an opera buffa - but the appearance of Darth Vader was truly ridiculous. I can't really say much because the music is so distant from anything I generally listen to except that the singing seemed to be good. But to me the opera is tedious, despite being brief, and the plot incomprehensible. But I applaud myself for trying something different.That evening I attended TIP's production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" directed by colleague Jonathon Hagans. He had a vision, and it worked. The cast of Athenians were reminiscent of PG Wodehouse while the fairy spirits were in the style of Lovecraft. It all worked very well with the mechanicals being the strongest members of the cast with Jon Reimer's Bottom being the standout.
The lovers were good - Demetrius outshining Lysander and both outshining Hermia and Helena, who were the weakest of the cast. I liked that Hippolyta had a Russian accent.
The spirit world was spooky and full of amazing special effects and additional creatures out of Hagan's imagination. Fog and interesting costumes and strange movements all added to the eeriness. Special mention must be made of the banshees who sang Bulgarian folk tunes - and even that worked. Prosthetics and Bottom's mule's head's movable ears, aerial silk performers, a strange lost mushroom, Puck's lighted hands, Oberon and Titania's amazing costumes - all somehow came together for an engaging and entertaining event. The time flew and I was enveloped in another world for a couple hours.
This was a good night at the theater and did exactly what it should have: made me want to see it again.
posted by Larry Wells @ 6:30 PM
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